It's well after last call and closing time--just shy of five in the morning in the morning--when Brigid O'Connell unlocks the doors to the Meeting Place again. They've only been closed for an hour, and already she's back to let the first of the contractors in.

"You'll need to start with the soundproofing," she says to the man in black next to her, smothering a yawn in the crook of her elbow as she cracks the front door. "And work fast because I open to the world at eight-thirty every morning for the first coffee rounds."

"Pretty early for a club to be open, isn't it?" one of the workmen asks. She gives him a tired smile as she holds the door open for them.

"That's why we're renovating."

Setting it up as a club in the beginning had worked out well, served their purposes. There were never enough agents coming and going from the offices upstairs anytime before late afternoon to elicit concern or comment from the locals. There hadn't been much demand to be open earlier. The noise from the dance floor had covered the occasional shouting match upstairs and the shadows had provided prime opportunity for a newly appointed sector lead to get a feel for the things that might cause supernatural trouble in her sphere of influence.

But times had changed. Nightclubs were suffering now, but lounges, with coffee and drinks and tapas and the like, now that was a smart buy.

She's fifty-three, married for nearly two years now, and she has to think toward her eventual retirement. This is investment property, after all.

She isn't going to run UNSETIC operations out of the offices above the Meeting Place forever.

Brigid trails the contractors into the space, locking the front door behind her. "I'll need any messes cleaned up by the time the doors open," she said, "or it'll come out of your commission, as stated in the contract. I'll get some coffee on for you."

She lets the contractors start their work. It will be slow to start, but eventually, the Meeting Place will be the best spot to stop in and have a nice drink or a good conversation this side of Central Park. She is certain of it.